Ebb & Flo: Short cut by Laura Bunting and Philip Bunting

This is the first book in this series that I have read – a very enjoyable experience and a book that I will be keeping for my grandson. Ebb goes off to have his hair cut, but his wriggling and jiggling means that Tut cuts and slips and Ebb gets a bad haircut. His friend Flo tries to reassure him but Ebb lets his hair grow and grow until it is out of control. What will he do?

This is a fun read aloud for pre-schoolers who will love the funny pictures of Ebb as he sits in the hairdresser’s chair and then grows his hair, refusing to get it cut. I loved the zany illustrations of Ebb’s hair when it grows past his knees and the many looks that he tries: the bun, the bowl, the bob and the tornado amongst others. There are so many laugh aloud moments in Short cut, appealing to both adults who might read it aloud and children who will love to giggle at the text and pictures.

The Ebb & Flo series is ideal for beginning readers, with its rhyming words, repetition and use of phonics. Short cut would be ideal as a book for parents to share, and for teachers to have as a supplementary reader in the classroom.

Themes of friendship and dealing with emotions are engaging, and as having a bad haircut is likely to be familiar, it is easy to relate to the story. And for children who love stickers, there is a page of them at the back, as well as instructions of how to draw Tut’s parrot.

Themes: Haircuts, Reading, Humour.

Pat Pledger